Hutchinson: Game Critics Show “Subtle Racism” as Japanese Titles are Favored

August 17, 2012
Written by Alex Osborn

Assassin’s Creed 3 creative director Alex Hutchinson has been quite outspoken in the past, so his latest comments regarding video game critics should hardly come as a surprise.

Speaking to CVG on unfair favoritism toward Japanese-developed games, Hutchinson lamented the alleged “subtle racism” prevalent in the industry. “I think there’s a subtle racism in the business, especially on the journalists’ side, where Japanese developers are forgiven for doing what they do. I think it’s condescending to do this,” he said when answering a question regarding the continued success of Nintendo.

Just think about how many Japanese games are released where their stories are literally gibberish. Literally gibberish. There’s no way you could write it with a straight face, and the journalists say ‘oh it is brilliant’. Then Gears of War comes out and apparently it’s the worst written narrative in a game ever. I’ll take Gears of War over Bayonetta any time.

It’s patronising to say, ‘oh those Japanese stories, they don’t really mean what they’re doing.’

Switching gears, Hutchinson steered away from the topic to then focus the conversation on the story of Assassin’s Creed 3 and the team’s excitement in the fact that fans are showing so much interest in the narrative.

“The best thing about it was that people had a view. That was perfect. People were debating it,” he said. “We had no interest in writing about the patriots or the defenders of king and country. I mean, these are very boring stories. It’s funny to see these debates online, and we just gave up trying to communicate on it because the game will speak for itself.”